BSc (Honours) Sport, Fitness and Coaching degree (mature student)

Hello,

This is aimed at anyone who has done the BSc (Honours) Sport, Fitness and Coaching degree with the OU (or maybe even a similar degree at a different university), or others who were in a similar position to me, and who can give me some advice.

I'm a 29-year-old guy who did a degree in a completely different subject area (Business and IT - graduated with first-class honours) and I graduated six and a half years ago. Since then I've been working in the digital marketing industry.

Parallel to that, as a hobby, I play football. In the past year or so I've been increasingly drawn towards coaching, partially because of recurring injury problems, but mainly because I've realised that I really enjoy it. Being able to spend my days outdoors involved in the game I love would be a dream come true.

Thanks to knowing the right people, I've been coaching on a voluntary basis at the academy of a good semi-professional club team since the summer and have also taken and passed the first level of my national football association's coaching ladder, so I at least have my foot in the door.

Because I've been enjoying coaching so much, I've started to think that maybe I could get involved in it full-time somewhere down the road. Obviously it's easier to become a professional coach if you were a professional player, but unfortunately that never happened for me. That means I'm going to have to get the right qualifications, experience, and most of all be good enough at it.

I intend on taking the first part of the UEFA B licence next summer, and aim to complete the second part the following summer. During that period I'm hoping to go to America for a number of months to coach full-time with one of the various British coaching companies that are out there, to gain experience. I'd probably keep going out there every year if possible and if it was worthwhile. I actually had an interview for one of them last month to coach in America for the second half of 2014, but unfortunately I wasn't successful. Now some time in 2015 will be the soonest that will probably happen.

Anyway, with all of this in mind, I'm thinking about different ways in which I could improve my chances of one day - hopefully sooner rather than later - getting a full-time job in football. Long story short, I have some questions for anyone who might be able to impart some wisdom:

- Would it be of any significant benefit to do a sport/coaching degree, such as this one at the OU? Or would it be an expensive waste of time? If not this degree, can you recommend another - bearing in mind that my A-level marks aren't great (C, D, E)?
- Would it complement or be completely superseded by UEFA coaching licences etc.?
- For anyone who has done this particular degree, did you enjoy it? Did you think it was worthwhile and relevant? Should you have done a similar degree at a 'proper' university instead?

Thanks for reading the novella.

Chris

(edited 10 years ago)

Reply 1

Vh2302

I'm in the exact same quandary...any advice would be appr